On the Divergence of a Proto-Indo-European Velar Syllabic Nasal in Indo-European Languages

Introduction. The proposed article critically examines the explanation of the origin of nasal vowels in Slavic languages by incorporating an open syllable law. It is shown that the convergence of many closed syllables, ending with nasal consonants, into two kinds of open syllables with nasal vowels contradicts a number of facts of evolution in the opposite direction, e. g., evolution of nasal vowels towards combinations ”a vowel – a nasal consonant“ in Balkan Slavic languages (Bulg. пент ”five“, вънзел ”knot“), as well as to the observed interpretation of Slavic nasal vowels in acts of borrowing by languages without nasal vowels, e. g. OCS дѫбрава ”oak forest“ > Rom. dumbrávă.

Methodology and sources. The proposed model results from generalization of the data of instrumental phonetical research, which show that the articulation of palatal consonants is unstable leading to there divergent evolution, i. e. transformation to sounds with more definite zones of articulation, e. g. palatal lateral approximant *[ʎ] split into palatalized lateral liquid [l'] and fricative [j]. In the proposed model Proto-Indo-European (PIE) syllable velar nasal consonant *ŋ̍ in the process of its phonetic evolution in Indo-European (IE) languages split into a variety of nasal vowels with different articulations, which further on irregularly transformed into vowels without nasalization or into combinations of vowels with nasal consonants (e. g. OInd. paŋktíṣ, OIsl. fimt, Lith. penkì, OCS пѩть, OHG finf, fimf, funf "пять", etc., from the common PIE prototype with syllable nasal *ŋ̍).

Results and discussion. Examples of PIE prototypes of lexemes meaning “water bird”, “tooth, sharp edge”, “five”, as well as lexemes, related to Russ. нутро, ядро, неясыть, уж, угорь, нагой, нога, ноготь are presented. All prototypes contain a nasal syllabic, which is split producing four types of reflexes in IE languages. Newly discovered etymological links, such as the connection between Russ. Lexemes meaning “leg” and “corner”, are discussed.

Conclusion. The proposed model permits to uniformly explain the facts of synchronous existence of related Rus. недро ”insides“ and ядро ”nucleos“, related нутро и утроба ”belly“, related OCS ѫты, Lith. ántis and AGr. Att. νῆττα “duck”, related Rus. неясыть “a kind of owl; pelican” and ненасытный “insatiable”, etc., using the notion of divergent evolution of the PIE syllable velar nasal *ŋ̍. 

1. Bernshtein, S.B. (2005), Sravnitel'naya grammatika slavyanskikh yazykov [Comparative grammar of slavic languages], 2nd ed., MGU, Nauka, Moscow, Russia.

2. Ancient Greek-Russian dictionary by I. H. Dvoreckiy, available at: https://classes.ru/allgreek/dictionary-greek-russian-old.htm (accessed 17.08.2019).

3. Slovari na IRISTON.COM [Dictionaries on IRISTON.COM], available at: http://slovar.iriston.com (accessed 17.08.2019).

4. Indo-European etymology, available at: http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/query.cgi?basename=\ data\ie\piet&root=config&morpho=0 (accessed 17.08.2019).

5. Vasmer, М. (1986), Russisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, in Larin, B.A. (ed.), Transl. by Trubachev, O.N., in 4 vol., 2nd ed., Progress, Moscow, Russia, available at: http://etymolog.ruslang.ru/ index.php?act=contents&book=vasmer (accessed 17.08.2019).

6. Dicționare ale limbii române (2019), available at: https://dexonline.ro (accessed 17.08.2019).

7. Harper, D. Online Etymology Dictionary, available at: http://www.etymonline.com/ (accessed 08.2019).

8. Indo-European Lexical Cognacy Database (LexDB version 0.9), available at: http://ielex.mpi.nl/ wordlist/all/ (accessed 17.08.2019).

9. Wiktionary, available at: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page (accessed 17.08.2019).

10. Recasens, D. (2013), “On the articulatory classification of (alveolo)palatal consonants“, Journal of the International Phonetic Association, vol. 43, no. 1, pp. 1–22.

11. Telezhko, G.M. (2016), “On the divergence of palatal lateral approximant in Slavic languages”, Universum: filologiya i iskusstvovedenie, no. 12 (34), available at: http://7universum.com/ru/philology/archive/ item/4029 (accessed 17.08.2019).

12. Telezhko, G.M. (2017), “On the divergence of a voiced velarized lateral approximant in indoeuropean languages”, Success of modern science and education, vol. 3, no. 1, pp. 100–102.

13. Telezhko, G.M. (2017), “Combinations of liquid consonants with vowels in the roots of words in languages of the indo-european family”, Universum: filologiya i iskusstvovedenie, no. 12 (34), available at: http://7universum.com/ru/philology/archive/item/4076 (accessed 17.08.2019).

14. Galinskaya, E.A. (1993), O khronologii nekotorykh izmenenii v sisteme vokalizma praslavyanskogo yazyka [On the chronology of some changes in the system of vocalism of the proto-Slavic language], available at: https://www.academia.edu/38029611/ (accessed 17.08.2019).

15. Meillet A. (2001), Le Slave Commun, in Bernshtein, S.B. (ed.), Transl. by Vain, A. and Kuznetsov, P.S. 2nd ed., Progress, Moscow, Russia.

16. Toshovich, B. (2011), Korrelyatsionnaya grammatika serbskogo, khorvatskogo i boshnyatskogo yazykov [Correlation Grammar of Serbian, Croatian and Bosnian], vol. 1, Part 1: Phonetics – Linguistics – Prosody, Languages of Slavic Culture, Moscow, Russia.

17. Florinskii, T. (1895), Lektsii po slavyanskomu yazykoznaniyu [Lectures on Slavic linguistics], vol. 1, Tipografiya Imperatorskogo Universiteta sv. Vladimira, Kiev, Rossiiskaya imperiya.

18. Moravcsik, G. (1967), Constantine Porphyrogenitus. De administrando imperio, in Moravcsik, G. (ed.), Transl. by Jenkins, R.J.H. Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, USA.

19. Meillet, A. (1903), Introduction à l'étude comparative des langues indo-européennes, Librairie Hachette et Cie, Paris, FRA.

20. Telezhko, G.M. (2019), “Evolution of an archaic morpheme with the semantics of possession”, Universum: filologiya i iskusstvovedenie, no. 4 (61), available at: http://7universum.com/ru/philology/ archive/item/7120 (accessed 17.08.2019).

21. Dal, V.I. (1863–1866), Tolkovyi slovar' [Dahl's explanatory dictionary], available at: http://dic.academic.ru/contents.nsf/enc2p (accessed 17.08.2019).

22. Telezhko, G.M. (2017), “On the divergence of proto-indo-european syllabic nasals in indoeuropean languages”, Universum: filologiya i iskusstvovedenie, no. 1 (35), available at: http://7universum.com/ ru/philology/archive/item/4178 (accessed 17.08.2019). Information